For as far back as I can remember, I always asked the question, “Why me?” I was filled with self-pity, and I constantly stuffed my feelings down with food. I was born a triplet, and we were diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy at a year old. My parents were always positive, and they instilled in us that nothing is impossible. However, the cycle of self-pity really started for me just a week after we moved into our handicap-accessible house when I was almost six. My triplet brother, Paul, developed pneumonia and passed away suddenly. I remember the day he died as if it happened yesterday. My entire life changed from that day forward, and I immediately began to question why my life was so terrible. The years following his death were pretty bad. I dealt with a lot of traumatic situations, including my mother almost dying after complications from gastric bypass... Continue Reading
Several years ago I was in a serious car accident and broke all the vertebrae in my neck, with severe impact to the spinal cord. I was in critical care for weeks before they could even do surgery. My family had been told that I would never walk again, but during surgery the doctor discovered that it was an incomplete spinal cord injury, and that with lengthy rehabilitation I had a chance to walk again. He said it would take a lot of hard work, but it could be done. I was in two years of physical rehabilitation, five days a week. I had to learn everything over again: how to dress myself, write, feed myself (an important activity), etc. With all I went through to fight my way back to health, mentally, spiritually and physically, I still couldn’t stop eating. Hadn’t I proved I was a person of will... Continue Reading
I recently had a case of the flu. I thought at first it was a bad cold coming on, but when the fever and chills started, I knew I was in for a battle. It is never fun to be sick, and staying abstinent can be a challenge during those times. My stomach was queasy, food tasted like paste, and my disease yearned for the comfort foods of my childhood. Thank God for the structure of this program. I knew it was important to try to eat my three meals each day, even though I didn’t have much of an appetite (quite a sensation for a food addict). In the past (at 297 pounds), I would have gone most of the day without eating, then eat and would have eaten a huge bowl of hot liquid comfort food and flour products. As I had a clearer sense of what my... Continue Reading
I am a food addict. I am amazed at the range of things that this FA program can help me with. I came to program because I hated my life. Every day I binged and purged. The only relief I had was short-lived. There were times when a combination of speed, booze, boys or just being passed out would end the dreadful, monotonous cycle…but not for long. Inevitably, I would end up back in my familiar rut, bingeing on my familiar foods and purging in whatever toilet I could find. I was too tired to blame anyone anymore or try to understand it. I just did it. I couldn’t work, have friends, have hobbies or develop reasons to live. I was alive merely because I was repeatedly unsuccessful at suicide. Upon entry to FA I was told that recovery from food addiction was possible. It wasn’t a moral issue; rather,... Continue Reading
Last night, I had a very interesting conversation with my 16-year-old daughter who was sharing with me her feelings regarding a situation with her friends at school. I have been in program for six-and-a-half years, and thinking about this interaction with my daughter sent me back twelve years ago, to when I was in the food, my life was unmanageable, and I was a raging mum. That day, my two-year-old son was sitting in his high chair. My then four-year-old daughter must have done something wrong—I can’t even remember what—because I was yelling and screaming at her, my tense, red face so close to hers that she was walking backwards. I was throwing the tea towel on the floor, pacing back and forth from the kitchen to the living room, waving my arms in the air like a mad woman. I caught the look on my son’s face and all... Continue Reading
